The curtainhad barely fallen on his 2012 presidential campaign before Rick Santorum asked his top supporters: what’s next?

With his insurgent White House bid, Santorum cut himself a path back to national prominence. Starting on the night of the Iowa caucuses and proceeding through a series of conservative Southern and Midwestern primary contests, Santorum gradually regained much of the standing he lost when the voters of Pennsylvania ran him out of office six years ago.

It’s very much an open question where Santorum’s political aspirations will lead. But on a Tuesday afternoon conference call, Santorum was already asking some of his strongest backers for advice on where he should next set his sights.

“He conveyed his genuine sense of calling to public service — and public service means more than just elective office,” said Colin Hanna, the Pennsylvania conservative activist who heads the group Let Freedom Ring. “He solicited suggestions from his supporters on how he could and should continue to give voice to the themes that touched so many, so positively, during his campaign.”

Said Hanna: “His theme is not, 'my campaign is over.' His theme is: ‘I feel a sense of calling to this work. What’s the next phase?’”

Multiple conservative leaders who participated in the call said Santorum indicated he is not implacably opposed to Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign, and one participant emphasized “he’s not bitter” about how his 2012 effort ended.

“I think he’s doing exactly what he needs to do, and that is to take a little time, probably get some sleep. Rick was that candidate that really believes what he’s saying and continues to feel really strongly and deeply about the issues of the day,” the Santorum supporter said. “I think he understands that it’s important for him to be involved in the process, and we all want him to” participate in some way.

Though Santorum did not endorse Romney in his concession speech Tuesday, adviser John Brabender said it would be wrong to read into that any hesitation about helping the presumptive GOP nominee. Brabender said Romney had called Santorum and expressed a desire to meet and discuss how Santorum could be helpful, and that Santorum had been receptive.

“Rick felt it was more appropriate to see if the governor is going to ask for Rick’s endorsement,” said Brabender, who has advised Santorum since he first ran for the House in 1990. “Today, we felt that the message was very clear that the senator’s suspending his campaign.”

Over the long run, Santorum is likely to have a variety of opportunities. He could attempt to run for statewide office again in Pennsylvania or mount another national campaign in 2016 if President Barack Obama is reelected this year.

In the nearer term, Santorum’s options may be greater in the advocacy and commentary arena. He could potentially return to his old gigs as a Philadelphia Inquirer columnist or a guest host for radio-talker Bill Bennett, sources said, or perhaps to his former position as a Fox News contributor. (A Fox spokesperson was not immediately available for comment.)

But Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser, whose anti-abortion rights group endorsed Santorum and aired radio ads on his behalf, said it was far from obvious how Santorum would channel his ambitions on a larger scale.

“In terms of his future, I have to admit I don’t really know. With Santorum, he’s a guy who truly is about calling and vocation. It’s not a word that most people in politics use very often,” she said. “He’s spent the last several years involved in projects that were really designed to influence our culture at the heart of it. It’s very unpredictable. He is not a predictable political guy.”

While Santorum has gained enormous prestige among conservatives thanks to his campaign, there’s no telling how long that political boost will last — or whether it would be enough to make Santorum competitive as a candidate in his home state again, or against a bumper crop of 2016 Republican up-and-comers.

Several Republican operatives expressed skepticism that Santorum could find a place in a Romney administration. He might have a role to play in the general election, strategists suggested, but whether Santorum would be an effective surrogate in rallying conservatives to Romney’s side is difficult to predict.

Much as he is an energizing figure on the right, Santorum has also proven enormously divisive among key groups Republicans will need to court this fall, including suburban voters, women and other independent-leaning electoral blocs. For the same reason, the former senator’s future in electoral politics is uncertain.

Mark DeMoss, an evangelical public-relations executive who advises Romney, suggested that Santorum’s value as a fall surrogate would be greater the sooner he backs Romney.

“I think Mitt Romney was helpful to John McCain, I think Sen. McCain would acknowledge that. Mitt quickly endorsed the senator who he’d been running against a week or so earlier,” DeMoss said. “I think [Santorum] has some credibility with a lot of people in the party to say, ‘Look, I ran this time because I thought I’d be a better president, but now I’m going to get behind him.’ I think he can be a huge help. My prediction is he will be.”

Former Michele Bachmann adviser David Polyansky, who participated in a Texas conclave of evangelicals that backed Santorum in January, cautioned against assuming that anyone other than Romney is in a position to try and unite the right for the fall.

Santorum has “got a great opportunity to go out on the trail and help Republicans earn victory in November. He’s earned that right and I think he has a real role in doing that,” Polyansky said. “The conservative movement is pretty diverse and so I’m not sure that there’s any one person who can step in and take that mantle other than our nominee. Right now, it’s Mitt Romney’s opportunity to represent conservative voices and nobody else’s. And frankly it’s time for Newt Gingrich to follow suit” and drop out.

Santorum could also serve as an effective fundraiser or campaigner for some House and Senate candidates in handpicked congressional districts with conservatives voters who were responsive to his message and got to know him in the presidential primary.

For Santorum’s most loyal boosters, however, the question of whether he can help Romney or vault himself back into future public office is secondary in importance, for now.

To them, the more important point is that Santorum has proven what his admirers believed all along: that he can be a tribune for social conservatism even when the Republican Party and the national political conversation has homed in on issues of dollars and cents.

“I think Rick is poised to be an outstanding leader and a leading voice for social conservatives from now on,” said Santorum endorser Penny Nance, who heads the group Concerned Women for America. “I think he has built an even larger platform for himself than he had as senator.”

Ralph Reed, the Faith and Freedom Coalition leader who was neutral in the GOP race, said that “whatever you think of his views, given his limited resources, this was a very impressive candidacy.”

“This was a guy who was an asterisk in the polls,” Reed said. “His future is very bright. I think at a minimum, he’s going to be a very important voice for conservatives.”